Energy producers, government agencies, and responsible consumers strive to initiate, enforce, and practice energy conservation measures, respectively. With respect to consumers, turning off lights when leaving a room, lowering the thermostat in winter or increasing the thermostat in summer, or purchasing energy-efficient appliances, are all popular approaches to energy conservation. However, despite concerted conservation efforts, the demand for energy of all types continues to increase beyond what conservation alone has been able to achieve. As towns, cities, states, and countries grow, the demand for energy of all kinds has increased, resulting in what many analysts identify as an energy crisis. The energy demand increases have many root causes. Overconsumption of energy has imposed strains on natural resources ranging from fossil fuels to renewables such as wood chips, resulting in fuel shortages and increased environmental pollution. Population growth and the desire to provide electricity to previously underserved or unserved regions put further strains on energy sources by increasing the numbers of energy consumers who can now perform daily tasks such as washing, cooking, entertaining, illuminating, and heating and cooling of their houses and apartments. In addition to domestic use, the energy increases also result from expanded economic activities such as manufacturing, transportation, and retail, to name but a few.
Energy distribution problems are frequently identified as a hindrance to solving the energy crisis. Insufficient energy distribution infrastructure and aging energy generation equipment are unable to keep pace with the increased energy demands. Renewable energy options remain largely unexplored or underdeveloped. There is strong and vociferous resistance by adjacent landowners and others to siting of windmills, solar farms, or wood burning plants. Even when plans can be made to construct such energy producing facilities, energy distribution is stymied by the poor distribution infrastructure. Commissioning of new energy generation facilities remains a seemingly unobtainable objective. Legal wrangling, construction delays, pollution mitigation requirements, overwhelming costs, or even war, have prevented, halted, or delayed new energy generation facilities coming online. Energy wastage is also a major concern. Aging appliances or manufacturing equipment, incandescent light bulbs, and poor building insulation and air sealing, all waste energy in comparison to their modern counterparts.
To meet the increases in energy demands, national, state, and local public officials, plus city and regional planners, have been faced with deciding among three broader choices: to increase energy production by building new power plants, to reduce energy demand through energy conservation, or to combine both of these strategies. More recently, another emerging option is to source energy production based on renewable energy sources such as solar, wind, geothermal, wave action, and so on. One major limitation of many renewable energy sources is that the sources do not produce consistent amounts of energy 24 hours per day. Solar energy, for one, only produces energy in the presence of light, and produces varying amounts of energy depending on the intensity of the light hitting photovoltaic panels. Energy sources and demands must be balanced so that clean, reliable, and consistent energy is available to all consumers throughout the country.